Page 24 of Soul Redeemed

The sleepy haze loomed over Denya as she sat listening to the deep breathing of the others, and her eyelids grew heavier by the minute. Rolling her head against her shoulders, she gave a sharp shake that damn near spun her eyeballs out, and triple blinked.

Have to stay awake. An annoying tickle hit the back of her throat, and despite her efforts to keep her mouth clamped, she caved in to the third yawn in minutes. Not the coziest place they’d stayed, particularly as she’d felt the patter of bug legs earlier, but she had to believe her captors had opted for the well to keep them safe from something. Even if the three of them didn’t say much outside of the occasional terse command, Denya had a sense that each of the girls held some value to them, and that whatever had taken the girls in the night made them just as uneasy.

Through the narrowing slit of her eyes, she kept her focus on Safina’s peaceful face as she slept.

A flash of white hit her periphery. Flipping her lids wide open, she scanned the dim space and rubbed her eyes. “Damn, must be seeing things,” she muttered.

A minute passed with nothing. No movement. Her muscles slackened with each minute that followed, her breaths arriving even and calm again. Sleep tugged at her eyelids, and Denya thought how wonderful it would feel to erase the burn by closing them.

A jerk at her arm brought her to the realization that she had closed them, and when she opened her eyes again, she was greeted with a hand slapped over her mouth and two beady black eyes staring into hers. They belonged to one of the female demons she’d seen earlier, on the path toward the abandoned well. The female had been sitting out on her dilapidated front porch, sewing, as she’d watched the girls march down the path with their captors following close behind. At the time, Denya hadn’t bothered to put up a fight or scream for help, because she’d sensed something evil about the woman. Could’ve been the sinister smirk on her lips, or the deformed squint of her eye that’d given her away, but something had kept Denya from acting on her instincts. One hand trapped beneath the painful pressure of the demon’s bent knee, Denya lifted her other hand to shake Safina, her effort cut short by the tight grip at her wrist.

Fear vibrated through her muscles, and she let out a scream against the palm at her mouth to alert the others.

In her periphery, Denya could sense the others shifting. The moment Safina let out a sleepy moan, the weight against Denya’s legs lifted and the barrier at her mouth disappeared, along with the female demon and Safina.

Tears welled in Denya’s eyes, her body stiff and cold. So goddamn cold. She stared down at her legs, where just moments ago, Safina had lay peacefully sleeping.

No screams.

No struggling.

No evidence that she’d ever lain there, at all.

The shouts of the other girls filtered in as a distant echo.

And then it hit Denya. All at once, the realization hit her, and she lifted her gaze to the panicked expressions of the other girls.

One by one, they were being picked off.

“Did you see it, Denya? What happened? Please, tell us!” Felice’s voice didn’t prompt her to acknowledge the girl.

Instead, she lifted her gaze to the stars once more. “Help!” Her voice hardly carried, still choked by shock. “Help!”

Only when the others screamed in unison did the first waves of urgency beat through Denya’s bones. For the first time in weeks, she’d gotten a look at their assailant.

She had to find Safina. She had to get her back.

She’d promised.

14

Screams breached the void, ripping Ava from the blackness that tugged her deeper. She clawed at the sounds that echoed through her skull and opened her eyes to the white ceiling, across which shadows rollicked.

Two figures tumbled and swung at one another, while other shadows danced around them. With a frown, Ava lifted her head, and the film that coated her eyes stretched the scene to a blur, before sharpening into the view of Calix and Logan fighting.

Gavin stood locked between them, as he attempted to block Logan’s swings. The redhead from downstairs stood with her hands lodged in her hair, shouting at the males. Calix pushed against his eldest brother’s back, before coming around to pop Logan in the jaw. The veins in his neck pulsed a rhythm of rage, and his snarls and growls gave him all the features of a wild animal that’d been unleashed.

“I’ll fucking kill you!” he yelled, taking his brother to the floor, and scrambled over top of him, hammering his fist into Logan’s face. “You’re dead!”

Beside Ava, the chain of Diablis steel that Logan had wrapped around her throat earlier, called to her. If she could get it around Logan, she might immobilize him—if she could get it around him without being pummeled to the ground first.

In spite of the weakness begging her limbs to stay put, Ava flopped onto her elbows, and the moment her bones smacked against the marble floor, she army-crawled toward the chain and, once she’d retrieved it, continued on toward the two brawling brothers.

“Calix.” Her voice arrived as a rasp, failing to overpower their shouts. “Calix!”

“Logan!” A second voice thundered inside the room, and Ava looked up to see the familiar blonde standing in the doorway, clutching her belly. “Stop, this instant!”

At her command, the male paused mid-punch and took a hard blow to the cheek, the crack rippling down Ava’s spine as Calix socked his brother in the face. At that, Logan growled and volleyed another punch, throwing Calix to the floor.